Title: Interesting Dynamics
Author: ZombieJazz
Fandom: Chicago PD
Disclaimer: I don't own them. Chicago PD and its characters belong to Dick Wolf. The character of Ethan has been created and developed for the sake of this AU series.
Summary: Hank and Erin are forced to re-explore their complicated 'family' dynamic when an unexpected 'family emergency' causes Voight to have to deal with demons related to his wife's death, his failings in parenting, and the challenges his work has created for his family and for his ability to be the father he wants to see himself as.
Ethan was staying with his arms crossed defiantly across his chest when Hank got to the living room. He looked at him a moment. Sometimes he found some of the shit his kids tried to pull with him to be so fucking ridiculous. Like they thought being pissy, spoiled brats – crossing their arms, giving him glares and snark, talkback or the silent treatment – did anything for them. Like he didn't deal with worse shit from far more intimidating and threatening people than anything Ethan, Erin and Justin could manage even if they banned together. Occasionally it made him want to pull out a real smackdown for them. But he usually just reminded himself that it was just kids acting like kids. They were treating him like all kids eventually treated their parents – being little snots about their supposed injustices that he was inflicting on them.
He pointed at the armchair. "You going to sit down?" he put to Ethan but his son just crossed his arms tighter.
Hank offered no comment to that and went and sat on the couch, crossing his legs and settling into the corner of it. He shared the icy glare Ethan was giving him for several beats, running his tongue across the front of his teeth as he waited. Giving Ethan the chance to make a move – to let out some of his anger. But he didn't.
Hank let out a slow breath while he examined his son. "You know, you were unplanned," he finally told him. Ethan's glare thickened. "We've never really talked about that before. Didn't need to. You likely figured it out on your own."
"You mean a mistake," Ethan said flatly. There was an edge of anger to his voice.
But Hank just gave him a small thoughtful frown and shook his head. "No. Unplanned," he restated. "Your mom and I just weren't trying to get pregnant. But we were probably being a little careless about some things given our age and stage."
Ethan looked away. "Gross," he muttered.
Hank shrugged. "Sure. When you haven't popped your cherry the concept of having sex in your forties is likely—"
"You don't know that!" Ethan spat at him.
Hank gave him a look and patted his hand on the edge of armrest. "What? That you're a virgin? Magoo, your sister just handed me a receipt for some $30 tshirt for you to wear in a fucking swimming pool because no one is allowed to look at you. You going to try to bullshit me into believing you can't swim or be in public without a hat on – but you're good dropping your drawers for some girl?"
Ethan just looked away from him.
"Ethan, you're twelve," Hank said. "Wait a few years until your short and curlys come in and then we can trade this B.S." He sighed and shook his head. "What I was saying was that doctors don't much encourage you to have kids in your forties. We had all these idiots doing this fucking fear mongering. That you might be autistic or Downs Syndrome. Or Asperger's or ADHD or diabetes. It was just this never-ending list of afflictions that we should 'be prepared for'. And I was like, 'Jesus Fuck, what am I going to do with this kid?' Diabetes, ADHD. OK. Fine. We'd figure it out. But autistic or Downs Syndrome? Spinal bifida? I didn't know how the fuck we would handle that. What'd that mean for our family. Your mom, though, the whole pregnancy she just kept reciting – telling me – that you were going to be fine. You were going to be this healthy, beautiful, perfect little boy."
He looked at his son – and gestured at the armchair again. "Sit down," he said a little less firmly.
Ethan let took a deep breath – his chest visibly expanding and then a cough rattling out of him and his hand flying up to support his mending ribs as it did. His face fell a bit more with the pain of it and he carefully moved to the chair and sat – but only on the edge – and he examined the ground, almost like he was looking at the floor under the coffee table.
Hank watched him for another moment and then continued. "It was a really fucking easy pregnancy despite all the bullshit from the doctors. All these extra appointments since we were apparently geriatrics. But it was fine. Your mom had the worst morning sickness and migraines with Justin. The swelling in her ankles. Fuck. They looked like watermelons. But with you? It was fucking smooth sailing. Too good to be true. So then I guess it wasn't."
His son looked up at him, his brow creasing. Hank looked at him seriously.
"Your mom had a bit of a medical emergency. Things weren't right. So we got her to the hospital and they had to cut you out. About three weeks early."
"Mom said I was a C-section," Ethan said quietly.
Hank nodded. "You were," he agreed. "But there was a bit more to it then that. So I'm in there losing my mind about your mom and you. And I've got two teenaged kids in the waiting room losing their minds – so I'm trying to manage that too. We're all a fucking mess. Except your mom. Again she is with this mantra that you're going to be fine. That you're just being a little bugger. Wanting to get out early and meet us all."
Ethan made a small noise and went back to looking at the floor. Hank allowed him a thin, barely visible smile. The comments were so Camille. Ethan might've only been seven when he lost his mom but he knew it too.
"And they pulled you out—"
"Were you there?" Ethan asked quietly.
"Fuck, yes," Hank said firmly. "You think I'm some hands-off asshole stuck in the 1950s?"
Ethan gave him a small questioning glance.
"I was there for you," he said firmly. "I was there for Justin. I'm the one who drove your sister home too. The day each one of you joined this family – I was there. Now I don't have some long melodramatic list of 'best days' of my life. But the day each of you kids arrived in this family – they were pretty good days for me."
Ethan gave him a squint. Hank could tell he was processing that.
"They change you," Hank told him. "You're not going to understand that now. And that's OK. Your brother is just starting to get it. He's going to really get it a few months from now. Believe me. But getting to see your kids – to hold them – for the first time. There's something to that."
Ethan gave him a look. Hank moved his eyes, though, as he thought about it for a moment, smacking his lips slightly and looking at the floor too.
"I didn't get to hold you, though," he said finally. "That was hard for me. Bothered me a lot. Fought with the doctors a bit about it. All this, 'I'll be damned if I'm not going to get to hold my son' verbiage." He shook his head as he remembered. He'd made a scene. Likely embarrassed Camille even though they had her all doped up for the surgery. "Got to touch you, though. We had you on your mom's chest for a bit but they grabbed you pretty quick." He made a shape with his hands measuring out a rectangle. "Had you in this box. To keep you warm. All these fucking tubes and monitors attached to you. You were so small. "
Ethan looked at him. "You and Mom never said that before? Or J or Erin."
Hank shrugged. "You were only in there about 10 days. You just needed some time for your lungs. To get you to suckle. Eat. You still don't fucking eat right," he said more pointedly.
Ethan looked back down embarrassedly at that. "I'm still small too."
Hank allowed another little shrug. "That could be lots of things. Genetics aren't in your favor there, Magoo. You got me and your grandpa in you."
Ethan glanced up slightly again.
"We got to hold you more after they got you set up in there. But I usually deferred to your mom with them working on the whole bonding and getting you to suckle thing. It was like, 'Ethan, just fucking eat so we can take you home.' Stubborn. Or a slow learner," Hank said with a shake of his head. Maybe some things didn't change there either. "It was hard, though. Not getting to hold you. And being in the hospital. I remember thinking, 'My kid isn't going to be in here again. Not like this. Not with all these fucking tubes and monitors and beeping and asshole doctors feeding us bullshit.' But I guess I didn't do a very good job at keeping you out of there."
He watched as Ethan's head slowly bobbed up to him and gazed his way.
"Ethan, I have never thought you were retarded. I don't fucking like that word. Even before you were born we had the doctors telling us to expect that. But you weren't. You never were. And you aren't now. You're as stubborn as fuck. But you know what? Your mother laid that one all on me too. What the fuck am I going to expect? Whether either of us like it or not – you've got me there in your genetic mix. You're going to be stubborn. I've got three fucking headstrong kids. But you – Magoo – you take it to another level. It's kept you alive. Back as a newborn. Back with the accident. And, it's going to get you through now."
"Because something is wrong with me now?" Ethan asked quietly.
Hank let out a slow sigh. "Things aren't quite right. You know that."
"The doctor said something's wrong?"
"Dr. Pelican wants us to go back to the Trauma Center."
"I don't like it there!" Ethan protested, sitting up straight in the chair and casting him an urgent look.
"You aren't supposed to like it there," Hank said.
"I don't want to go back there," Ethan pressed more pointedly.
Hank flared his nostrils. "I know," he allowed. He didn't fucking want to go back there either. "But it's just … so they can rerun some tests. Do some more imaging."
"WHY?!" Ethan demanded.
"Because you suffered a traumatic brain injury, Ethan," Hank said firmly.
"They said I was OK! You said I was OK! It was a long time ago!"
Hank shook his head and let out a breath. "Magoo, come sit here," he said and put his hand next to him on the couch cushion.
"No," Ethan said firmly.
Hank looked at him for a long beat. Part of him hoped that his eyes would communicate to his boy how much he needed him to come and sit next to him – so they could have this conversation face-to-fact. So he could keep up the eye contact. So he could touch his fucking kid – give him some sort of support and affection in this. But Ethan stayed planted where he was.
He sighed. "E, I'm not a medical expert. I like doctors about as much as you. Probably less. But I need to hear out what they've got to say when they are telling me something about my kid. And, Dr. Pelican says we should go back and see Dr. Kendall and get some imaging done. Let them do some of those tests they put you through again."
"But I didn't hit my head again!" Ethan pressed back at him. It was starting to sound like a whine. There was an underlying teariness to it.
"OK, according to the doctor that doesn't really matter," Hank tried to tell him calmly. He tried to figure out how to explain this when he was trying to find a way for himself to understand and accept it already. He sat forward on the couch, uncrossing his legs and resting his elbows on his knees, searching for his son's eyes. "You were just a little kid when it happened, Ethan. And our brains – they grow and develop until you're about your brother's age. OK? But you're at an age where things are growing and trying to work a little differently – just like the rest of your body. But some of the things happening right now with you, it could be your brain telling us that it's having trouble keeping up. OK? And it's likely having trouble keeping up because of what happened. Not because something new happened. Not because you did something wrong. Or because your sick. Just because you got hurt, Ethan. And the doctors couldn't see all that hurt then. We might just be starting to see some of the hurt now. Now that you're growing up a bit."
"NO!" Ethan very nearly yelled at him. His face was red. Hank couldn't decide if it was from anger or if he was fighting so hard to hold in tears. Angry, frustrated, devastated tears.
"It may be no," Hank agreed. "Dr. Pelican may be wrong. But the only way we're going to find that out is if we go see Dr. Kendall at the Trauma Center and do some of these tests."
"NO!" Ethan yelled at him again.
Hank sighed and sat back in the couch again, gazing at his trembling son. "E, it's not a yes or no kind of thing. It's what we're doing."
"No," Ethan said a little more meekly. And he rattled as it did some out, a tear escaping.
"Come here," Hank said again flatly. That time holding out his arms in a small offering of a hug.
Ethan sat there looking at him and trembling for several seconds. But then he rose and almost scurried over before nearly crumpling against him.
"I'm fine, Dad," he sobbed.
Hank just rubbed his back and let him cry it out. He didn't argue with him. He didn't embarrass him by acknowledging the tears. Just let him let some of it out. He was still a fucking little kid. And the fucking rug was just getting pulled out from under him again. And again and again.
It went on for some time but Ethan finally shifted in his awkward positioning. It was likely more awkward for the kid than him. Ethan was still sort of standing though most of his weight had pushed Hank back into the couch while the boy's legs sprawled out on the floor and his face buried into his shoulder. The movement saw him settle himself on the cushion next to him and look at him.
"I'm fine, Dad," he offered again with a lot less vigor. He'd exhausted himself with the rattled sobs.
Hank lifted his hand and swiped a still stray tear from his face. Ethan turned his cheek with some embarrassment but Hank ignored it. Reaching then with the opposite hand and using both his thumbs to gently smooth the streaked partner of tears into the kid's skin. Ethan just sniffled at him and lifted his own hand to swipe away the snot collecting under his nose and upper lip. Ethan already had the shoulder of Hank's shirt so soaked with tears and snot that he briefly contemplated lifting his own sleeve to clean off the kid's nose too. But instead it rose and went to his little office space, retrieving a Kleenex box and pulling out two tissues that he handed to his son who pawed absently at his nose, giving him a hurt puppy dog look. It actually looked more like the dog had been run over.
Hank sat back down next to him. "You aren't fine," he said with a quiet firmness. "Something is going on and we need to get it sorted out."
"I'll do better," Ethan whined at him.
Hank gave him a frown and shook his head, patting at his boy's knee a couple times. "E, while your sister had you out, I did a little bit of reading about this stuff in kids your age," he said, "just to make sure Pelican isn't talking out of his ass. And, some of the shit I read scared me. I don't scare easily. And this stuff? About my kid?" He shook his head. "Violent, aggressive behavior. Substance abuse. Self-harm. Suicide. No."
"Dad," Ethan teared up again. "It's just schoolwork. I'lll try harder!"
Hank put his hand on the back of his boy's head, cupping it and then squeezing at his neck. "Magoo, it's not just the schoolwork. You're starting to experiment with drugs."
"It was just pot, Dad!" he cried. "I only did it three times. I swear! I won't do it again."
"You're fighting," Hank said to him again.
"You fight! Justin fought!" His tears were streaming again.
"Ethan, it's different with you," Hank told him firmly. "I need to be more conscious of it. OK? I admit when I'm wrong. You know that," he said and looked directly into his eyes. "I needed to send you to broading school. It was where you needed to be while things settled down and got sorted out. But, I should've brought you home after they did. I was wrong to leave you there. I should've had you here where I could keep an eye on how you were doing and how your schoolwork was going and have you into the doctors and Pelican. I messed up. And, now we need to play catch up."
"I didn't do anything!" Ethan whined loudly. "Nothing that Justin and Erin didn't do. Nothing that other kids don't do too!"
"We need to make sure – that you're just being a kid. That there isn't something else going on."
"There's nothing going on!" he pressed.
"There could be," Hank put back to him sternly but then softened. "Your brain was really hurt, Ethan. I know we don't talk about that much. We talk about your scars. But the hurt people can't see, Magoo. What we can't see. That's what we need to worry about. It's what we've got to talk about. And we need to go in and get it checked out."
"I'm fine, Dad!" Ethan tried again.
"Ethan, you aren't," Hank said raising his voice just slightly and squeezing the back of his neck just a bit more firmly. He sighed as he did it and released the grip, stroking at the hair on the back of his neck a couple times before sitting back from his son slightly and taking a slow breath to reframe himself.
"I don't want you to end up doing something stupid and landing yourself in jail," Hank said. "I don't want to see you hurting another person. And, Ethan, I do not want to see you doing something that gets you hurt. Or you hurting yourself. I lost your mom. I thought I lost you…"
Hank had to look away from him a moment. He felt his own eyes fighting back watering and he looked at the floor. He didn't cry. But there were times that things stung. Remembering that night. What he saw on that road. Their vehicle. It hurt.
"I'm not doing that again," he said more quietly after giving himself time to recompose.
His biggest unspoken fear was that at some point he would have to do it again. That some other asshole would hurt his family. That Erin would end up shot or hurt or killed on the job. That Justin would do the same – off in some fucking foreign country. Get himself blown up or worse. And he'd be doing it all again. But if he had to do it again with his baby boy? His only kid who was still a kid? He didn't know he had it in him to do it again. Not with any of his kids. But especially with Ethan. Especially if he didn't get Ethan to adulthood. It'd kill him.
Hank finally managed to look back to his son. He'd quieted but was staring at him with broken questioning. He likely sensed that he'd been near tears. That didn't happen often. It happened even less often in front of his children. It was likely even more jarring for the boy.
"I was there then too," Hank told him. "I know you don't remember that either. But I was on the scene. I was there with you on that road, Magoo. And, I was in the ambulance with you. And, I was with you in the hospital. I didn't let you out of my sight. With all the tubes and all the monitors and all the fucking beeping and the surgeries and you so fucking small in the bed for weeks and weeks. All these doctors preparing me for the fucking worst. And, here you are. Still fucking here, Ethan. It's where you're staying. We're going to the fucking doctors'. End of discussion."
